Hey Everybody, how are y'all? We had a beautiful week here in NY, rained once-a real soaker, and cool nights, nice for sleeping. The garden looks good. I'm picking green beans, and snuck a few red potatoes; and the basil, tomatoes and peppers are finally taking off. I made 3 batches of blueberry jam, 2 of plum, and a big batch of three bean salad. Gosh, they sure look pretty. The new grain mill is getting a workout, the novelty hasn't worn off yet! I'm having corn grits for breakfast, with homemade butter, yum yum!!

There's a great farm near here where I buy raw milk. It was a pretty emotional experience for me the first time I went. He has 300 acres, around 80 cows, including this years calves, milking around 35 or 40. He has chickens, tons of cats, dogs, and a horse, and several large gardens. He grows all the feed for the cows and chickens. I left there just bawling, it made city-living even more painful. Well, I go up to the barn once a week, and relish every minute of it, and try to soak up enough "country" to last me 'til the next visit. I got to see a 20 minute old heifer-calf last week, looks just like her mom, all white with a sprinkling of tiny black dots.

I figured it out-less than 40 weeks to go 'til we move to MO!! We're making lists, and drawings, and buying supplies a few at a time. I picked up more stuff for the first-aid kit, and more canning lids. Kevin decided he needs a miter saw, so we'll add that to the list. This is so exciting, we are going to meet Gail (buddy from CS forum, and my soon-to-be neighbor) in less than 75 days.

What are you up to? Cathy

-- Cathy in NY (hrnofplnty@yahoo.com), July 30, 2001

Answers

Sooner than you can say lickety splickety bingled dee bap, you will be on your own place just a sweatin'!!! Cool.

I have been on baby watch for Peaches who was due Saturday. She is starting to soften at the tail, so I believe she will be blessing the world with more goatees today!! I am not nearly as nervous as I was when my other doe freshened earlier this spring. Peaches isn't super huge with babies, so I feel a bit more relaxed. Plus I have another birthing under my belt,so I think the experience factor is really helping out with the nerves.

The garden has really slowed. I ripped out most of my pickle cukes because they were just running all over everything and going from a teensy fruit to a yellow giant in a day if they did anything at all. Toms and peppers are still going, and the luffa is setting fruit. Basil is still good as well, but everything else is done in.

I lost some chickens to heat stroke, and a rabbit this week. that always makes me sad, but where you have life you will have death, so it's something to try to learn from and try to take in stride. I need to get the electric to the coop fixed so the ceiling fan works in there. Yes, I put a ceiling fan in my coop. It was only $10 and last summer it helped a lot! The hens are starting to molt now, so eggs are down a tic.

That's about it for here! I will let everyone know about Peaches later... I hope today!

-- Doreen (bisquit@here.com), July 30, 2001.

Just came in from digging another bushel of potatoes. We had several inches of rain over the weekend. It's terribly muddy and already too hot and humid for me to dig any more. My grandson is visiting and was very helpful picking the taters up.

I took out quite a bit of stuff last week. We've had too much rain and I don't have time too mess. We will have corn for supper tonight. There'll be enough to freeze. The tomatoes are there but not turning. I'm canning peppers and taters today and tomorrow, then Marques and I are going to bake cookies Wed. Grandma's get to do that this time of year:~}

It's so hard when the garden isn't what you want it to be.

We get the color chart today, so we can pick out the siding and roof for the farm. It has asbestos siding on it and sorta of a roof right now.:~[. Gary and his brother put duct work in part of the house this weekend.

Happy gardening and God Bless

-- Cindy (S.E.IN) (atilrthehony_1@yahoo.com), July 30, 2001.

Cathy you might want to hold off on buying stuff till you get moved. Things are much cheaper in Missouri...or at least southern Missouri. I'm too busy remodeling the house at the moment to do much gardening but I plan to put in a small fall garden next week. My daughter and I watched a doe and her 2 fawns in the backyard this morning for about 30 mins(they may still be there just finally got tired of watching). They were about 20 ft from the back door!

-- Amanda in Mo (mrsgunsmyth@hotmail.com), July 30, 2001.

Hey Amanda, are you staying in MO, or just fixing up the place to sell? I know a while back you were talking about going back to Texas. I'll explain about the supplies I'm buying-I'm afraid that all the little stuff that I ~think~ we need will nickel and dime us to death once we get there. We're going to have to rent a U-haul truck anyway, so I figure we may as well fill it up. Also, I'm only buying stuff on sale, loss-leaders. Well, it's good to hear that prices are lower down there!

-- Cathy in NY (hrnofplnty@yahoo.com), July 30, 2001.

I've been busy this summer. We've been cutting firewood, showing the horses, trying, in vain, to find someone to hay our field--I've given up it's way past prime, now I need to find someone to brush hog the hayfield and horse pasture. Thank goodness I have hay left over from last year. I didn't get a garden in this spring, I was laid up for a while, but I'll be buying produce in bulk and canning in a month or so. Well, that's my summer in a nutshell. I really doesn't sound like much written down but I've been really busy!

Stacy in NY

-- Stacy Rohan (KincoraFarm@aol.com), July 30, 2001.

Bought 6 new Saanen goats {hubbys going to kill me soon} had 2 goats freshen {1 doe , 2 bucks}, so now i'm milking .Got 9 new pigs , 1 new cow {auction on weds who knows how many more }.I am trading a calf for a nice older horse for the kids this week .Got a 1 horse open sleigh at auction .Tim got a welder .Got a cow with a booboo , cat miscarried.And ow yea I have a horse trailer and a rake ! Still need the hay bine and baler .

-- Patty {NY State} (fodfarms@slic.com), July 30, 2001.

We have had less than an inch of rain in July and now the month is over! You can imagine that the garden is not doing as well as we would like. Since we're on a well we can't waste water by using it on the garden. Between the drought (this is our third or fourth year of it) and the deer we've been blessed to get anything. The blueberries are doing great though! The deer got into our strawberries again and there's practically nothing left of them. We had them covered with screen held down on the ends by 2x6's. Something moved the screen - don't know if it was the deer themselves or kids. Our pears and apples have been doing great. I thought I would do more canning this year but it's been so hot that most everything is going in the freezer instead. Maybe I'll freeze it for now and can it when it gets cooler. It's the time of year when I need to start planning our school year too, so it is busy around here!

-- Deena in GA (dsmj55@aol.com), July 31, 2001.